The National Institute of Education (NIE) has launched three studies to answer key questions about the impact of private tuition here.

At the top of the list is whether tuition really improves students' grades or if it creates an unhealthy reliance which may make them worse.

The studies, which are expected to be completed by the end of next year, will also question if tutors help students understand content or if they merely drill children to be exam-smart.

Dr Shaljan Areepattamannil, who is heading the project, said he and his team will try to measure whether tuition does indeed raise scores in maths and English through the course of a year.

They will also look at tuition's effect on a pupil's motivation and interest in maths and English.

"Even if the study shows that tuition doesn't result in significant gains, parents and students may not be dissuaded. But for policymakers and educators, it may still be good to understand the impact and trends," he said.

At the same time, Dr Woo Huay Lit is heading a study on who the tutors are, and the types and quality of teaching in tuition centres.

Dr Trivina Kang's study, meanwhile, is looking at what parents expect from tuition, and the experiences of students here.

Research dean Lee Wing On said NIE embarked on the studies due to the high prevalence of tuition in Singapore.

He pointed to a study showing that between 1998 and 2008, tuition spending here doubled from S$410mil (RM1.05bil) to more than S$800mil (RM2.05bil).

"Besides the huge amount of money spent by parents, the tuition phenomenon is worth studying because it has repercussions at both the individual and national levels," he said.

"At the individual level, students can develop a strong reliance on their tutors and may pay less attention in class, knowing that their tutors will help them afterwards.

"At the national level, it has a bearing on our attempts to move away from the focus on exams towards a more holistic education.

"Extensive tuition also exacerbates social inequalities, which has become a pressing concern."

Lee, however, noted that tuition is hard to examine. There are many factors affecting academic achievement, and tutors vary in their methods and quality.

"From a research perspective, populations of students who do and do not receive tutoring cannot easily be compared because they are rarely uniform in other characteristics."

The debate on tuition gained national prominence recently after Senior Minister of State for Education Indranee Rajah said in Parliament that "our education system is run on the basis that tuition is not necessary".

Many parents and students, however, insist that tuition is needed to maintain an edge. — The Straits Times / Asia News Network

Korea's high educational attainment rate results in an overqualified workforce and shortage of skilled labour.

SEOUL: Having completed a bachelor's degree in business administration and psychology at a prestigious university and several internships in Korea and overseas, Ahn Ye-chan believed his future should be secure.

But the 27-year-old graduate's confidence is quickly fading in the face of a tight job market, which has forced him to lower his expectations.

At a recent job fair, he could not find one position that could fulfill his dream of working in international business.

"There are few entry-level positions available for foreign companies here. Now I am broadening my options and also trying to apply to some major domestic companies," he told The Korea Herald.

Ahn is the victim of a protracted slowdown, an industrial structure in which growth yields fewer jobs than before, and a disproportionally large number of university graduates in comparison to the new jobs available.

Amid a sluggish economy and lingering uncertainties, major companies are cutting down on spending and recruitment of new entry-level employees.

A survey of 916 companies by online job search site Incruit found that the entry-level openings at big firms are down 17.5% on-year.

A recent government report estimated that the nation's 30 largest public companies would hire about 1,200 new employees later this year, down 26% from 1,641 a year ago.

The dismal job market is likely to have the most serious impact on new graduates, like Ahn, who want a job straight out of college.

"I already feel a lot of pressure about getting a job soon and I don't want to fall behind," he said.

According to data by the Education Ministry, of 555,142 students who completed college and graduate school in August 2012 and in February this year, only 59.3% landed a job immediately after graduation, slightly fewer than the 59.5% the previous year.

The figures did not include graduates who work part-time at their colleges and pursue postgraduate degrees.

Some schools even reportedly use fake employment numbers for the annual assessment by the Education Ministry.

The ministry currently assesses the nation's 337 tertiary educational institutions each year.

And colleges ranked in the bottom 15% of the assessment are not able to receive financial support from the ministry the following year.

"One of the crucial assessment criteria is employment of graduates. To survive the assessment, some schools make drastic moves," a university worker said.

"The employment rate is a highly sensitive issue for all colleges here."

The government keeps adding jobs, but data show they tend to be low-paying, part-time or both. Still, many college graduates hold out for a job in state-run companies or government offices.

Last month, more than 126,000 people took a test for 1,400 entry-level positions at the Seoul Metropolitan Government, registering a record of 87.1 applicants for every vacancy.

"People say it's a miracle to pass the test in a first go. I expect it will take one or two years at least to pass the test. But I want to keep pursuing the job because it is stable and comes with social security and a retirement pension," a 25-year-old applicant told The Korea Herald.

Instead of looking for jobs, Park Tae-hoon, 25, a senior in Chinese language, launched his own business earlier this year.

"It seemed quite difficult to find a position that matches my major, so I decided to start my own business," he said.

He rented office space for free with support from the Seoul city government and managed to launch a news search website. But starting up isn't easy, he has found.

"The problem is not that I'm not making any money at the moment, but convincing people who think I started this because I couldn't find a job," he admitted.

The Education Ministry plans to strengthen entrepreneurship education for college students like Park and expand start-up infrastructure at universities.

For this, the ministry aims to raise the number of colleges offering entrepreneurship classes from the current 133 schools to 217 by 2017.

But critics still remain sceptical as young Koreans often avoid starting-up companies due to the high risks and negative social perception.

"(Compared to previous years) students are less interested in starting up a business as they don't like risk, and even if they show interest in a start-up, their family and friends try to dissuade them," said Chung Dae-yong, a professor in the Department of Entrepreneurship and Small Business at Soongsil University.

More than 65% of college graduates want a job at a major firm or state-run company, while only 2.3% of students said they wanted to work in small or medium-sized business after their graduation this year, according to a study by researcher Oh Ho-young of the Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training.

"Many graduates opt to remain unemployed rather than working at small businesses, as major companies consider applicants' foreign language skills and their academic backgrounds over work experience," he noted in the study.

Oh also pointed out that the rise in the youth unemployment rate is in line with the country's increasing college attainment rate.

Nearly 71%, or 446,474, high school graduates went on to college this year, the highest proportion among advanced countries.

Yet only 50% of college graduates were employed full-time in 2013, creating problems such as an overqualified workforce, shortages of skilled labour and mismatches between job seekers and businesses.

"Too many students now go to college, and their expectation for future jobs is higher than ever. We need to tackle this structural problem, encourage students and create more jobs that don't need a college degree," he added.

JAKARTA (Reuters) - More than 30 people were still missing two days after a boat carrying asylum seekers to Australia sank off the Indonesian coast, killing 22 people including seven children, Indonesian security officials said on Sunday.

The latest disaster to strike refugees using Indonesia's southern coast to try to make the perilous crossing suggests Australia's tough new immigration rules may not be enough to deter asylum seekers.

It will also cast a shadow over a visit to Jakarta on Monday by Australia's new conservative prime minister Tony Abbott, whose tough stance on immigration was at the heart of his election campaign.

Indonesian police said there was a total of 80 people on the boat, of whom 25 were rescued. That leaves up to 33 people still missing.

"We found the boat broken and destroyed," Indonesia's counter-terrorism agency, which went to the scene of the sinking with police, said via a text message.

"The illegal immigrants were from four countries (including) Syria, Jordan and Yemen." On Saturday, police said some of the passengers had also been from Lebanon.

About 400 boats carrying asylum seekers have arrived in Australia over the past 12 months and about 45,000 asylum seekers have arrived since late 2007, when the former Labour government relaxed border policies, eventually tightening them again in the face of a voter backlash.

Police said on Saturday the boat was headed for Australia's Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island, a frequent destination for refugee boats from Indonesia and a favoured route for people-smugglers.

The steady flow of refugee boats is a hot political issue in Australia, polarizing voters and stoking tension with neighbours like Indonesia and Sri Lanka over hardline border security policies that have been criticized by the United Nations.

In July, Canberra announced tough new measures to stem a sharp increase in the number of refugee boats heading for Australia from Indonesia. The new government has also stopped providing regular information on asylum boats turned away and emergencies at sea.

The new plans have been condemned by human rights groups, with Amnesty International accusing Australia of shirking its moral obligations to help the world's most vulnerable people.

Abbott has made Indonesia his first overseas destination since winning a general election on September 7.

He will meet President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to seek support for his plan to have Australia's navy turn migrants away and stop people traffickers operating from Indonesian ports.

Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa and other lawmakers have criticized Abbott's offer to pay Indonesian villagers for intelligence on people-smuggling gangs, and ridiculed the proposal to buy fishing boats often used to smuggle migrants.

HPAKANT, Myanmar (Reuters) - Tin Tun picked all night through teetering heaps of rubble to find the palm-sized lump of jade he now holds in his hand. He hopes it will make him a fortune. It's happened before.

"Last year I found a stone worth 50 million kyat," he said, trekking past the craters and slag heaps of this notorious jade-mining region in northwest Myanmar. That's about $50,000 (30,975 pounds) - and it was more than enough money for Tin Tun, 38, to buy land and build a house in his home village.

But rare finds by small-time prospectors like Tin Tun pale next to the staggering wealth extracted on an industrial scale by Myanmar's military, the tycoons it helped enrich, and companies linked to the country where most jade ends up: China.

Almost half of all jade sales are "unofficial" - that is, spirited over the border into China with little or no formal taxation. This represents billions of dollars in lost revenues that could be spent on rebuilding a nation shattered by nearly half a century of military dictatorship.

Official statistics confirm these missing billions. Myanmar produced more than 43 million kg of jade in fiscal year 2011/12 (April to March). Even valued at a conservative $100 per kg, it was worth $4.3 billion. But official exports of jade that year stood at only $34 million.

Official Chinese statistics only deepen the mystery. China doesn't publicly report how much jade it imports from Myanmar. But jade is included in official imports of precious stones and metals, which in 2012 were worth $293 million - a figure still too small to explain where billions of dollars of Myanmar jade has gone.

Such squandered wealth symbolizes a wider challenge in Myanmar, an impoverished country whose natural resources - including oil, timber and precious metals - have long fuelled armed conflicts while enriching only powerful individuals or groups. In a rare visit to the heart of Myanmar's secretive jade-mining industry in Hpakant, Reuters found an anarchic region where soldiers and ethnic rebels clash, and where mainland Chinese traders rub shoulders with heroin-fuelled "handpickers" who are routinely buried alive while scavenging for stones.

Myint Aung, Myanmar's Minister of Mines, did not reply to written questions from Reuters about the jade industry's missing millions and social costs.

Since a reformist government took office in March 2011, Myanmar has pinned its economic hopes on the resumption of foreign aid and investment. Some economists argue, however, that Myanmar's prosperity and unity may depend upon claiming more revenue from raw materials.

There are few reliable estimates on total jade sales that include unofficial exports. The Harvard Ash Center, which advises Myanmar's quasi-civilian government, has possibly the best numbers available.

After sending researchers to the area this year, the Harvard Ash Center published a report in July that put sales of Burmese jade at about $8 billion in 2011. That's more than double the country's revenue from natural gas and nearly a sixth of its 2011 GDP.

"Practically nothing is going to the government," David Dapice, the report's co-author, told Reuters. "What you need is a modern system of public finance in which the government collects some part of the rents from mining this stuff."

HIDING STONES

Chinese have prized jade for its beauty and symbolism for millennia. Many believe wearing jade jewellery brings good fortune, prosperity and longevity. It is also viewed as an investment, a major factor driving China's appetite for Burmese jade. "Gold is valuable, but jade is priceless," runs an old Chinese saying.

Jade is not only high value but easy to transport. "Only the stones they cannot hide go to the emporiums," said Tin Soe, 53, a jade trader in Hpakant, referring to the official auctions held in Myanmar's capital of Naypyitaw.

The rest is smuggled by truck to China by so-called "jockeys" through territory belonging to either the Burmese military or the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), both of whom extract tolls. The All China Jade Trade Association, a state-linked industry group based in Beijing, declined repeated requests for an interview.

Hpakant lies in Kachin State, a rugged region sandwiched strategically between China and India. Nowhere on Earth does jade exist in such quantity and quality. "Open the ground, let the country abound," reads the sign outside the Hpakant offices of the Ministry of Mines.

In fact, few places better symbolize how little Myanmar benefits from its fabulous natural wealth. The road to Hpakant has pot-holes bigger than the four-wheel-drive cars that negotiate it. During the rainy season, it can take nine hours to reach from Myitkyina, the Kachin state capital 110 km (68 miles) away.

Non-Burmese are rarely granted official access to Hpakant, but taxi-drivers routinely take Chinese traders there for exorbitant fees, part of which goes to dispensing bribes at police and military checkpoints. The official reason for restricting access to Hpakant is security: the Burmese military and the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) have long vied for control of the road, which is said to be flanked with land-mines. But the restrictions also serve to reduce scrutiny of the industry's biggest players and its horrific social costs: the mass deaths of workers and some of the highest heroin addiction and HIV infection rates in Myanmar.

There are also "obvious" links between jade and conflict in Kachin State, said analyst Richard Horsey, a former United Nations senior official in Myanmar. A 17-year ceasefire between the military and the KIA ended when fighting erupted in June 2011. It has since displaced at least 100,000 people.

"Such vast revenues - in the hands of both sides - have certainly fed into the conflict, helped fund insurgency, and will be a hugely complicating factor in building a sustainable peace economy," Horsey said.

The United States banned imports of jade, rubies and other Burmese gemstones in 2008 in a bid to cut off revenue to the military junta which then ruled Myanmar, also known as Burma. But soaring demand from neighbouring China meant the ban had little effect. After Myanmar's reformist government took power, the United States scrapped or suspended almost all economic and political sanctions - but not the ban on jade and rubies. It was renewed by the White House on August 7 in a sign that Myanmar's anarchic jade industry remains a throwback to an era of dictatorship. The U.S. Department of the Treasury included the industry in activities that "contribute to human rights abuses or undermine Burma's democratic reform process."

Foreign companies are not permitted to extract jade. But mining is capital intensive, and it is an open secret that most of the 20 or so largest operations in Hpakant are owned by Chinese companies or their proxies, say gem traders and other industry insiders in Kachin State. "Of course, some (profit) goes to the government," said Yup Zaw Hkawng, chairman of Jadeland Myanmar, the most prominent Kachin mining company in Hpakant. "But mostly it goes into the pockets of Chinese families and the families of the former (Burmese) government."

Other players include the Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings Ltd (UMEHL), the investment arm of the country's much-feared military, and Burmese tycoons such as Zaw Zaw, chairman of Max Myanmar, who made their fortunes collaborating with the former junta.

THE CHINA CONNECTION

Soldiers guard the big mining companies and sometimes shoot in the air to scare off small-time prospectors. "We run like crazy when we see them," said Tin Tun, the handpicker.

UMEHL is notoriously tight-lipped about its operations. "Stop bothering us," Major Myint Oo, chief of human resources at UMEHL's head office in downtown Yangon, told Reuters. "You can't just come in here and meet our superiors. This is a military company. Some matters must be kept secret."

This arrangement, whereby Chinese companies exploit natural resources with military help, is both familiar and deeply controversial in Myanmar.

Last year, protests outside the Letpadaung copper mine in northwest Myanmar triggered a violent police crackdown. The mine's two operators - UMEHL and Myanmar Wanbao, a unit of Chinese weapons manufacturer China North Industries Corp - shared most of the profits, leaving the government with just 4 percent. That contract was revised in July in an apparent attempt to appease public anger. The government now gets 51 percent of the profits, while UMEHL and Myanmar Wanbao get 30 and 19 percent respectively.

China's domination of the jade trade could feed into a wider resentment over its exploitation of Myanmar's natural wealth. A Chinese-led plan to build a $3.6 million dam at the Irrawaddy River's source in Kachin State - and send most of the power it generated to Yunnan Province - was suspended in 2011 by President Thein Sein amid popular outrage.

The national and local governments should also get a greater share of Kachin State's natural wealth, say analysts and activists. That includes gold, timber and hydropower, but especially jade.

A two-week auction held in the capital Naypyitaw in June sold a record-breaking $2.6 billion in jade and gems. But jade tax revenue in 2011 amounted to only 20 percent of the official sales. Add in all the "unofficial" sales outside of the emporium, and Harvard calculates an effective tax rate of about 7 percent on all Burmese jade.

It is, on the other hand, highly lucrative for the mining companies, whose estimated cost of production is $400 a ton, compared with an official sales figure of $126,000 a ton, the report said.

"Kachin, and by extension Myanmar, cannot be peaceful and politically stable without some equitable sharing of resource revenues with the local people," said analyst Horsey.

THE PECKING ORDER

At the top of the pecking order in Hpakant are cashed-up traders from China, who buy stones displayed on so-called "jade tables" in Hpakant tea-shops. The tables are run by middleman called laoban ("boss" in Chinese), who are often ethnic Chinese. They buy jade from, and sometimes employ, handpickers like Tin Tun.

The handpickers are at the bottom of the heap - literally. They swarm in their hundreds across mountains of rubble dumped by the mining companies. It is perilous work, especially when banks and slag heaps are destabilized by monsoon rain. Landslides routinely swallow 10 or 20 men at a time, said Too Aung, 30, a handpicker from the Kachin town of Bhamo.

"Sometimes we can't even dig out their bodies," he said. "We don't know where to look."

In 2002, at least a thousand people were killed when flood waters inundated a mine, Jadeland Myanmar chairman Yup Zaw Hkawng told Reuters. Deaths are common but routinely concealed by companies eager to avoid suspending operations, he said.

The boom in Hpakant's population coincided with an exponential rise in opium production in Myanmar, the world's second-largest producer after Afghanistan. Its derivative, heroin, is cheap and widely available in Kachin State, and Hpakant's workforce seems to run on it.

About half the handpickers use heroin, while others rely on opium or alcohol, said Tin Soe, 53, a jade trader and a local leader of the opposition National League for Democracy party. "It's very rare to find someone who doesn't do any of these," he said.

Official figures on heroin use in Hpakant are hard to get. The few foreign aid workers operating in the area, mostly working with drug users, declined comment for fear of upsetting relations with the Myanmar government. But health workers say privately about 40 percent of injecting drug users in Hpakant are HIV positive - twice the national average.

Drug use is so intrinsic to jade mining that "shooting galleries" operate openly in Hpakant, with workers often exchanging lumps of jade for hits of heroin.

Soe Moe, 39, came to Hpakant in 1992. Three years later, he was sniffing heroin, then injecting it. His habit now devours his earnings as a handpicker. "When I'm on (heroin), I feel happier and more energetic. I work better," he said. The shooting gallery he frequents accommodates hundreds of users. "The place is so busy it's like a festival," he said. Soe Moe said he didn't fear arrest, because the gallery owners paid off the police.

MOVING MOUNTAINS

Twenty years ago, Hpakant was controlled by KIA insurgents who for a modest fee granted access to small prospectors. Four people with iron picks could live off the jade harvested from a small plot of land, said Yitnang Ze Lum of the Myanmar Gems and Jewellery Entrepreneurs Association (MGJEA) in Myitkyina.

A 1994 ceasefire brought most of Hpakant back under government control, and large-scale extraction began, with hundreds of backhoes, earthmovers and trucks working around the clock. "Now even a mountain lasts only three months," said Yitnang Ze Lum.

Many Kachin businessmen, unable to compete in terms of capital or technology, were shut out of the industry. Non-Kachin workers poured in from across Myanmar, looking for jobs and hoping to strike it rich.

The mines were closed in mid-2012 when the conflict flared up again. Myanmar's military shelled suspected KIA positions; the rebels retaliated with ambushes along the Hpakant road. Thousands of people were displaced. Jade production plunged to just 19.08 million kg in the 2012/13 fiscal year from 43.1 million kg the previous year. But the government forged a preliminary ceasefire with the Kachin rebels in May, and some traders predict Hpakant's mines will re-open when the monsoon ends in October.

When operations are in full swing, the road to Hpakant is clogged with vehicles bringing fuel in and jade out. Such is the scale and speed of modern extraction, said Yitnang Ze Lum, Hpakant's jade could be gone within 10 years.

"Every Kachin feels passionately that their state's resources are being taken away," a leading Myitkyina gem trader told Reuters on condition of anonymity. "But we're powerless to stop them."

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States said on Saturday it had expressed serious concerns to Turkey over its decision to co-produce a long-range air and missile defence system with a Chinese firm under U.S. sanctions.

Turkey, a member of the NATO military alliance, announced this week that it had chosen the FD-2000 missile defence system from China Precision Machinery Import and Export Corp, or CPMIEC, over rival systems from Russian, U.S. and European firms.

CPMIEC is under U.S. sanctions for violations of the Iran, North Korea and Syria Nonproliferation Act.

"We have conveyed our serious concerns about the Turkish government's contract discussions with a U.S.-sanctioned company for a missile defence system that will not be inter-operable with NATO systems or collective defence capabilities," a State Department spokeswoman said.

"Our discussions on this issue will continue."

Some Western defence analysts have said they were surprised by Turkey's decision, having expected the contract to go to Raytheon Co, a U.S. company that builds the Patriot missile, or the Franco/Italian Eurosam SAMP/T.

The United States, Germany and the Netherlands each sent two Patriot batteries and up to 400 soldiers to operate them to southeastern Turkey early this year after Ankara asked NATO for help with air defences against possible missile attack from Syria.

Turkey has long been the United States' closest ally in the Middle Eastern region, bordering on the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The U.S. military exercised great influence over a Turkish military that had a strong hand in Turkey's politics.

Under Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, elected in 2002, the role of the Turkish military in politics has been curbed. Political and military relations between Ankara and Washington, while still close, play a less central role and that could be reflected in procurement policy.

NEW DELHI: AirAsia's Group Chief Executive Officer, Tan Sri Tony Fernandes, said he has no issue with the recent tie-up between Tata Sons and Singapore Airlines (SIA) to set up a full-fledged airline in India.

Tata Sons will own 51 per cent of the new airline and SIA 49 per cent.

"I have and continue to have no issue on SIA and Tata.

"No difference to Ginger and Taj Hotels. These are two very separate business," he tweeted on Saturday.

Ginger is a budget hotel chain owned by Tata, while Taj is its luxury hotel line.

NEW YORK: Government shutdown. Federal default. These looming political threats to the U.S. economy might scare investors to buy more U.S. Treasuries in the coming days as they seek a shelter for their cash.

While a protracted government shutdown, and particularly a default, could harm to the image of Uncle Sam's debt, its safe-haven appeal looks unchallenged in the short term.

Worried about rising chances that federal workers and contractors won't get paid if much of the government shuts down on Oct. 1 amid a political standoff in Washington, investors are expected to go by the conventional crisis playbook - dumping assets perceived to be higher-risk and rushing into those seen as lower risk.

An extended shutdown, which would include furloughs and temporary unpaid leave for many government employees, would have a direct impact on businesses who rely on government contracts or spending by government employees. It could also lead to delays in spending on big-ticket items by companies and consumers as confidence takes a hit.

That could all harm economic growth and make it less likely that the Federal Reserve will curb its stimulus program through bond buying, further supporting prices of government debt.

Failure to do so could threaten a debt default but many analysts think the government would slash spending before declining to pay its creditors, leaving Treasuries relatively unscathed, at least initially.

Analysts said a risk-aversion move could push benchmark yields on 10-year notes below 2.50 percent, more than 0.50 of a percentage point below the two-year high above 3 percent set in early September. Late on Friday they were trading at about 2.63 percent.

"It's paradoxical that a government shutdown or hitting the debt ceiling is good for Treasuries, but you most likely would see a flight-to-safety into Treasuries," said Bill Cheney, chief economist at John Hancock Financial Services in Boston.

INVESTOR CONFIDENCE

Any fears about a protracted government shutdown haven't been reflected in recent trading. This month, Treasuries are likely to post their first gain in five months as the sector recovered from its summer swoon, sparked by the Federal Reserve decision last week to maintain its bond purchase program.

Growing demand for some Treasury obligations that mature before the Oct. 17 debt limit deadline knocked their interest rates to below zero this week. A month ago, they traded at 0.02 percent.

The yields on benchmark 10-year Treasuries have already fallen to their lowest levels in six weeks partly on safe-haven bids on bets about a possible government shutdown next week.

Still, a long-lasting government shutdown, or, even worse, a default, could harm the Treasuries market.

"You don't want to damage investor confidence in U.S. Treasuries," said Craig Dismuke, chief economic strategist with Vining Sparks in Memphis, Tennessee. "If there is a flight-to-safety, it would a temporary one."

Ironically, the wrangling between President Barack Obama and Republican lawmakers over the budget, the debt ceiling and the Affordable Care Act - also known as Obamacare - was renewed at a time when the U.S. fiscal picture has improved this year.

Higher tax receipts, even in this sluggish recovery, have helped lower the federal deficit and reduced the government's borrowing needs.

PAST LESSONS

Washington last shuttered government offices and stopped paying workers for five days in November 1995 and then from mid-December 1995 to early January 1996.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury notes ended that year at 5.76 percent, down from 7.88 percent at the beginning of the year. The yield had begun falling earlier that summer after the Fed started cutting interest rates in July.

More than 15 years later, under the threat of a federal default, the 10-year yield has fallen 0.6 percentage point from just above 3 percent in three weeks during late July to early August of 2011, when Republican lawmakers and President Barack Obama were also bickering over raising the debt ceiling.

In the derivatives market back then, traders ratcheted up their bets on a U.S. default. The price of thinly-traded credit default swap contracts, which might have paid out if the U.S. government missed its debt payments for an extended period, jumped to 62 basis points, which was the highest since the worst days of the global credit crunch, according to data firm Markit.

This meant an investor would have paid 62,000 euros a year to insure 10 million euros worth of Treasuries against a default within a five-year period. The contract is denominated in euros to offset the impact of a default on the U.S. currency.

On Friday, the price on the five-year CDS on U.S. Treasuries was nearly 32 basis points, the highest since May.

It is difficult to predict what might transpire the coming days.

"Looking at history, there is not a clear pattern," said Cheney at John Hancock.

In contrast, the S&P tumbled 14 percent in the summer of 2011 during the first debt ceiling fight between Obama and the Republicans and following Standard & Poor's stripping of the United States' AAA-rating. Investors stampeded into Treasuries from stocks.

While many still expect that the White House and Republican leaders will come up with temporary fixes to avert a government shutdown and a default, analysts said there is some nervousness given that political leaders have remained far apart.

"We are conditioned for an 11th hour deal, but you can't take anything for granted," said Eric Green, global head of rates, currency and commodity research at TD Securities in New York.

If Washington were able to keep the government running and paying its bills, the 10-year yield will likely rise back to around 2.75 to 2.80 percent. It would also allow Wall Street to focus on whether the economy is showing any signs of picking up steam and the timing of the Fed's bond buying pullback, analysts said.

"The Fed tapering is way more important than all of this," Cheney said. - Reuters

NOBODY has ever calculated the percentage of Malaysia's workforce in sales, but it's likely up in the Asia-Pacific Top 10, along with the most Manchester United fans outside of the United Kingdom, smartphone market penetration, and the over-the-last-year Candy Crush addiction.

To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Moving Others by Daniel H. Pink deals both with selling goods and services, and the all-important business of selling yourself in one of the most fluid job markets on the planet. And also the selling (also known as pitching) of your ideas to your employee in order to stay ahead of the power curve.

So, like it or not, most of us are in sales, in one way or another.

To Sell Is Human looks at the curious mix of art and science of selling in gratuitous detail and with, in places, wry humour. There are surprises here too, such as Pink's opinion that extroverts don't make the best sales people.

Here you'll also find six successors to the "elevator-pitch", the three rules for understanding another of your potential customer's perspective, the "five frames" by which you can enhance the persuasiveness of your message, and more.

The result is a perceptive and practical work with applications for job hunting, work, and even study.

But before we go any further, who is this Daniel Pink fellow? Just another American business guru-cum-keynote speechmaker? Well, he's a bit more than that. Pink's served at the highest levels of politics and public service, having worked as an aide to US Secretary of Labour Robert Reich, and from 1995 to 1997 was chief speechwriter for former US Vice-President Al Gore.

This is Pink's fifth best-selling book focusing on the "changing workplace" that has appeared on the New York Times Best-Sellers list. The others are: Drive – The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, The Adventures of Johnny Bunko – The Last Career Guide You'll Ever Need, A Whole New Mind – Why Right Brainers Will Rule the Future, and Free Agent Nation – The Future of Working for Yourself.

His articles on business and technology have appeared in the usual list of illustrious American publications, from the Harvard Business Review to Wired.

Pink can write with verve. At times, he uncannily reads the mind of the reader and offers simple but compelling metaphors to illustrate a particular finding or concept.

Pink's basic premise is simple. He posits that we all spend considerable energy each day trying to get others do what we want or request. A purchase, a new job, an agreement, a deal, and sometimes even just simple obedience.

One professional he interviewed expressed it most lucidly. "Almost everything I do involves persuasion. Whether you directly sells products, participate in teamwork efforts, attempt to direct the behavior of others or run your own business, you are, in effect, selling or more specifically, moving others to do something."

Perhaps when a reader of The Star hears the word "sales", one of the images that might come to mind is the annoying cable-TV salesman, attempting to convince you to overpay for service and a multitude of channels that you don't actually need.

Pink reviews the historical protocol for selling and determines that it has morphed with the zeitgeist. The instantaneous access to information through the Internet has completely altered the balance of power in sales exchanges. Consumers know far more, and will – in the middle of your sales presentation – look up what you just said on their smartphones. Pink's book offers strategic advice on how to adapt this harsher paradigm.

The former speechwriter for Al Gore tells us that far from being a world of "us and them", we, in some shapes or forms, are all in sales: whether it's selling a product old-school style, selling our skills to a potential employer or selling an idea to have it supported and funded.

In fact, he argues that the first thing that homo sapiens did was sell to each other. I disagree, I'm sure they had sex with each other, discover fire and invent the wheel before sales became part of the human condition. But one does get Pink's point, and he alludes to it elegantly.

"The ability to move others to exchange what they have for what we have is crucial to our survival and our happiness. It has helped our species evolve, lifted our living standards and enhanced our daily lives. The capacity to sell isn't some unnatural adaptation to the merciless world of commerce. It is part of who we are."

And although he talks of "honesty, directness and transparency" now being the more fruitful long-term route, most of us who have caught others attempting to take advantage of us will know that there are still plenty of ignorant and nefarious sellers out there – something that Pink reminds us of:

"The decline of information asymmetry hasn't ended all forms of lying, cheating and other sleazebaggery."

He goes on to suggest how we can be better sellers – the first step being to see "rejections as temporary rather than permanent, specific rather than universal and external rather than personal."

He also acknowledges the grimly inevitable. "Anyone who sells – whether they're trying to convince customers to make a purchase or colleagues to make a change – must contend with wave after wave of rebuffs, refusals and repudiations."

Many of his points are reassuringly fresh. "To sell well is to convince someone else to part with resources – not to deprive that person, but to leave him better off in the end."

All in all, a highly practical book on the crowded "How To Sell" shelf of your nearest bookstore. And head and shoulders above the competition.

Thre Do's and one Don 't gleaned from
To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Moving Others

Do be mindful of the importance of taking the perspective of others.

Do subtly mirror the movements of your potential customer or customers in order to make them more receptive to you.

Do remember that the quality of a solution depends on the complexity of the problem.

Don't feed people with reasons to agree with you. Rather, guide them to find their own reasons for doing so.

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PETALING JAYA: The biodiversity study done at the 400-million-year-old Gunung Kanthan in Perak will include independent experts recommended by conservation groups, said Lafarge Malaysia Bhd.

Lafarge Cement Sdn Bhd senior vice-president (industrial) Jim Ruxton said it had invited WWF-Malaysia and the Malaysian Nature Society (MNS) to be involved.

"The study will include independent experts agreed to by them as well as experts from Lafarge Group's International Biodiversity Panel," he said in a recent interview.

MNS president Prof Dr Maketab Mohamed had been one of those who voiced opposition to Lafarge's plans to move its limestone quarrying activities to the southern portion of the hill, classified as areas C and D.

He had expressed worry that the karst ecosystem there would be affected, given that the hill had majestic caves and a rich variety of flora and fauna including the endemic trapdoor spider Liphistius Kanthan, which is critically endangered.

When contacted, Dr Maketab confirmed that he had recommended experts Liz Price and Dr Ruth Kiew to participate in Lafarge's biodiversity study.

"We have stressed that areas C and D must be conserved as a unit due to the interactive nature of the ecosystem," he said.

Dr Maketab had urged Lafarge to continue extracting limestone in areas A and B by moving its operations downwards through open cast quarrying, which involves accessing reserves below ground through digging, cutting or blasting.

Ruxton said that there was potential to do open cast quarrying there but could only be considered once areas A and B were fully developed.

"But we still won't be able to do open cast quarrying until the upper limestone deposits are taken down to ground level," he said.

Ruxton stressed that Lafarge had not ruled out any option until it received the results and recommendations of the biodiversity study, which is being headed by Universiti Malaya's Biological Sciences Institute head Prof Dr Rosli Hashim.

The team's findings, expected to be completed in December, will be presented to Lafarge's international panel, which in­­cludes independent representatives from WWF-International, IUCN France and the Wildlife Habitat Council.

"We want to see first what the biodiversity issues are. Then we will work on a biodiversity management plan that is in agreement with not just Lafarge, but MNS and WWF-Malaysia," he said.

They received the Panglima Setia Mahkota (PSM) award, which carries the title "Tan Sri", that was bestowed by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong in conjunction with the ruler's official birthday celebration last June.

KUALA LUMPUR: A consignment of radioactive material caused a scare when it toppled at the Kuala Lumpur Airport Service (KLAS) Cargo complex at the Low-Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT).

LLCT Fire and Rescue Department operations commander Azmi Saddon said KLAS Cargo employees were moving the box of UN2916 material when the cargo toppled and the content spilled on the floor at round 11.15am on Friday.

"However, no one was injured as the level of radioactivity from the spilt content was low. It did not pose any danger to people."

According to the International Maritime Organisation, UN 2916 consignments are Class 7 radioactive material, commonly used for medical and public health purposes.

Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd senior general manager of operations services Datuk Azmi Murad said fire and rescue officials swiftly contained the area and cleared the mess two hours later.

"There was no cause for alarm as the leak was small and was brought under control by the proper authorities," he said.

Amritapuri (India) (AFP) - India's "hugging saint", who has hugged more than 32 million people around the world, celebrated her 60th birthday on Friday in the company of disciples from around the globe.

The celebrations for the charismatic spiritual leader, known as Amma or "mother" to her millions of devotees, have stretched over three days at her ashram complex in Amritapuri, on a stretch of coastline in southern India's Kerala state.

The guru, formal name Mata Amritanandamayi, hugs people in her globe-trotting crusade to spread "selfless love and compassion", according to her website.

As part of the birthday celebrations she dispensed her trademark hugs, was serenaded by songs of "Happy Birthday" and announced a series of charitable initiatives.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh praised Amma in a message, saying that "her life is dedicated to society".

"Coming here and seeing all of the people makes me realise how many people need Amma. She is not just hugging people, she is changing lives," tweeted Eliza Shackelford, an American who was at the celebrations.

Ten years ago, Amma, marking her 50th birthday, hugged thousands of people non-stop for 24 hours, according to media reports.

Disciples at the ashram on Friday washed Amma's feet in a sign of love and devotion.

The ceremonies also included a marathon prayer for world peace.

Amma travels the world, regularly going to the United States, Britain and other destinations, hugging people.

The plump, smiling guru, says she is connected to an "eternal energy source" which means that she is never tired.

She grew up in a Kerala fishing community, the eldest daughter of a low-caste family. According to her official biography, she started hugging people when just a child "to comfort them in their sorrow".

While born to a Hindu family, she embraces all faiths and calls herself a "servant of god".

She launched her ashram several decades ago and it receives millions of dollars a year in donations. She operates a large charitable organisation which provides health care, education and disaster relief. - AFP

SINGAPOREANS are living longer and not having enough babies to replace themselves, meaning the swiftly ageing population has fewer working citizens supporting the growing pool of elderly.

These worrying trends, which emerged from the latest population figures released yesterday, can exert significant pressure on Singapore's economy, society and governance in future, said experts. They added that those working may have to toil longer and pay more taxes, and the Government will need to invest more in elder-friendly facilities.

These will be in demand by a growing number of Singaporeans, with those aged 65 and above forming 11.7% of the citizen population this year, up from 7.8% in 2002.

This year's Population in Brief report also showed that the old-age support ratio – which is the number of citizens in the working age band of 20 to 64 needed to support one older citizen – is decreasing rapidly.

It has fallen from 8.4 in 2000 to 5.5 today. But a better picture emerges when permanent residents are included, with the ratio at 6.4 this year, down from 8.7 in 2002.

According to World Bank data, Singapore has the highest proportion of older residents and the fastest ageing population in South-east Asia.

It is greying much faster than other developed nations such as Australia, the United States and most European countries, though the rate is on a par with Hong Kong's and slower than Japan's and South Korea's.

Economists and demographers say this will mean greater demand for health care and elder-care services, and elder-friendly infrastructure such as barrier-free accessibility features in transport and housing.

DBS economist Irvin Seah said that with the Government inevitably spending more, it will mean a "heavier financial burden on the working population, which in turn may mean higher taxes".

But Selena Ling of OCBC said that the state may continue with its redistributive tax model, where the rich pay more through wealth and asset taxes.

"Singapore has been financially prudent, we can afford to draw down on our reserves as well," the economist added.

An ageing population will also require a slight "re-orientation" of the economy, she said.

This would involve a greater focus on developing medical services and attracting more workers to the sector, as well as increasing productivity and the use of technology in jobs so that people can continue to work as they age.

Still, some population statistics gave cause for cheer. More Singaporeans are getting married, with 23,192 marriages involving at least one citizen last year, up from 22,712 the year before.

Singapore residents are also continuing to have more babies.

After hitting an all-time low of 1.15 in 2010, the total fertility rate (TFR) was 1.2 in 2011, and 1.29 in last year's Dragon Year – though it is still below the replacement rate of 2.1.

This upward trend was seen across all three major races, with the biggest increase among the Chinese. — The Straits Times / Asia News Network

Amritapuri (India) (AFP) - India's "hugging saint", who has hugged more than 32 million people around the world, celebrated her 60th birthday on Friday in the company of disciples from around the globe.

The celebrations for the charismatic spiritual leader, known as Amma or "mother" to her millions of devotees, have stretched over three days at her ashram complex in Amritapuri, on a stretch of coastline in southern India's Kerala state.

The guru, formal name Mata Amritanandamayi, hugs people in her globe-trotting crusade to spread "selfless love and compassion", according to her website.

As part of the birthday celebrations she dispensed her trademark hugs, was serenaded by songs of "Happy Birthday" and announced a series of charitable initiatives.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh praised Amma in a message, saying that "her life is dedicated to society".

"Coming here and seeing all of the people makes me realise how many people need Amma. She is not just hugging people, she is changing lives," tweeted Eliza Shackelford, an American who was at the celebrations.

Ten years ago, Amma, marking her 50th birthday, hugged thousands of people non-stop for 24 hours, according to media reports.

Disciples at the ashram on Friday washed Amma's feet in a sign of love and devotion.

The ceremonies also included a marathon prayer for world peace.

Amma travels the world, regularly going to the United States, Britain and other destinations, hugging people.

The plump, smiling guru, says she is connected to an "eternal energy source" which means that she is never tired.

She grew up in a Kerala fishing community, the eldest daughter of a low-caste family. According to her official biography, she started hugging people when just a child "to comfort them in their sorrow".

While born to a Hindu family, she embraces all faiths and calls herself a "servant of god".

She launched her ashram several decades ago and it receives millions of dollars a year in donations. She operates a large charitable organisation which provides health care, education and disaster relief. - AFP

SINGAPOREANS are living longer and not having enough babies to replace themselves, meaning the swiftly ageing population has fewer working citizens supporting the growing pool of elderly.

These worrying trends, which emerged from the latest population figures released yesterday, can exert significant pressure on Singapore's economy, society and governance in future, said experts. They added that those working may have to toil longer and pay more taxes, and the Government will need to invest more in elder-friendly facilities.

These will be in demand by a growing number of Singaporeans, with those aged 65 and above forming 11.7% of the citizen population this year, up from 7.8% in 2002.

This year's Population in Brief report also showed that the old-age support ratio – which is the number of citizens in the working age band of 20 to 64 needed to support one older citizen – is decreasing rapidly.

It has fallen from 8.4 in 2000 to 5.5 today. But a better picture emerges when permanent residents are included, with the ratio at 6.4 this year, down from 8.7 in 2002.

According to World Bank data, Singapore has the highest proportion of older residents and the fastest ageing population in South-east Asia.

It is greying much faster than other developed nations such as Australia, the United States and most European countries, though the rate is on a par with Hong Kong's and slower than Japan's and South Korea's.

Economists and demographers say this will mean greater demand for health care and elder-care services, and elder-friendly infrastructure such as barrier-free accessibility features in transport and housing.

DBS economist Irvin Seah said that with the Government inevitably spending more, it will mean a "heavier financial burden on the working population, which in turn may mean higher taxes".

But Selena Ling of OCBC said that the state may continue with its redistributive tax model, where the rich pay more through wealth and asset taxes.

"Singapore has been financially prudent, we can afford to draw down on our reserves as well," the economist added.

An ageing population will also require a slight "re-orientation" of the economy, she said.

This would involve a greater focus on developing medical services and attracting more workers to the sector, as well as increasing productivity and the use of technology in jobs so that people can continue to work as they age.

Still, some population statistics gave cause for cheer. More Singaporeans are getting married, with 23,192 marriages involving at least one citizen last year, up from 22,712 the year before.

Singapore residents are also continuing to have more babies.

After hitting an all-time low of 1.15 in 2010, the total fertility rate (TFR) was 1.2 in 2011, and 1.29 in last year's Dragon Year – though it is still below the replacement rate of 2.1.

This upward trend was seen across all three major races, with the biggest increase among the Chinese. — The Straits Times / Asia News Network

Some 120 asylum-seekers from Lebanon, Jordan and Yemen were believed to be on the boat that broke into pieces and sank off Indonesia on Friday in rough seas, with 28 plucked to safety and around 70 still unaccounted for, police said.

"The waves are just too high for our speed boats to go out yet. They're four to six metres (13 to 20 feet). We hope conditions improve soon," Warsono, a police official in Cianjur district on Java, told AFP, adding no helicopter had been deployed.

The sinking was the first deadly asylum boat accident since Tony Abbott became Australia's prime minister earlier this month and days ahead of his first state visit to Indonesia, where his tough boatpeople deterrence policies are likely to be the focus of talks.

The 22 bodies were found floating in an estuary, swept ashore by large waves, and were mostly children who could not swim, Warsono said.

One Lebanese man escaped from the sinking boat by swimming to an island -- but he believes his eight children and pregnant wife were killed, an official in Lebanon said.

Hussein Khodr called people in his home village of Kabiit "and told them that the boat sank at dawn, when waves destabilised the vessel", said Ahmad Darwish, local government head in the northern Lebanese village.

Survivors said they were trying to get to Australia's Christmas Island, closer to Java than mainland Australia, and are the latest to cross the treacherous stretch of water that has claimed hundreds of asylum-seekers' lives in recent years.

Abbott vowed to "stop the boats" during his election campaign as the country seeks to combat an influx of asylum-seekers by sea, a highly divisive political issue in Australia.

He plans a two-day visit on Monday to Indonesia, where senior officials have been rankled by his boatpeople policies, which include towing boats back from Australia's waters to Indonesia's. - AFP